Hobart's Beaker Street Festival extends season with new events and venues

Following an impressive positive response, Hobart’s Beaker Street Festival organisers have announced they are extending a major element of their Festival program, Hobartica, for an extra week and expanding the precinct footprint with four additional venues.

Alongside the extended run, the Festival has also released more than 40 new events - most of which are free - bringing fascinatingly eccentric science and art encounters across Hobart.

Hobartica, the Festival’s Antarctic precinct, invites the public in for polar experiences, wild encounters, and even a nightly Antarctic Jazz Lounge with Festival Founder and Executive Director Dr Margo Adler enthusing “Hobartica is a polar outpost, right here in Hobart. We’re inviting the public to connect with Antarctica in exciting new ways, through two weeks of immersive Antarctic programming.”

Step into Hobartica: Tasmania’s Antarctic Playground
Positioned on the harbour at Mawson’s Place, Hobartica transforms one of the world’s five Antarctic gateway cities into a living, breathing polar outpost. The precinct is part science hub, part art installation, part late-night hangout. Visitors can sip Antarctic cocktails in a jazz lounge, catch a live ‘celestial concert’ from inside a glowing geodesic dome, chat with expedition scientists and sub-zero tractor drivers, and catch nightly talks, parties and stunning Antarctic footage and soundscapes. It all kicks off with the gloriously absurd Krill Party in celebration of World Krill Day, featuring a live krill tank, glowing zooplankton cocktails, a DIY crustacean costume station, and a live krill cover band.

A major new highlight for Hobartica will be the installation of four new pop-up venues, named after Australia’s Antarctic research stations, Casey, Davey, and Mawson, with an additional venue called Macca, to be located in Bellerive and named after Australia’s sub-Antarctic Macquarie Island research station. These Antarctic dome structures will host experimental artworks, a series of live Celestial Concerts, opportunities to engage with participating artists and scientists, and even an Antarctic station loungeroom. A free night ferry will connect the attractions in Hobart and Bellerive on the Festival’s first weekend.

This year also marks 50 years since Australian women were first included in Antarctic expeditions. To commemorate this important milestone, the Antarctic Women’s Network will host a nightly series of powerful presentations by Antarctic women, from inside the Antarctic Jazz Lounge at the Waterside Pavilion. Additionally, Hobartica will incorporate telescopes and stargazing with the Astronomical Society of Tasmania in both Hobart and Bellerive, special events and free openings of the Mawson’s Huts Replica Museum, Roving Antarcticans at the Lark Cellar Door, and an extra week of sessions for the hugely popular polar plunge and sauna experience.

A City Jam-Packed with Scientists
All across Hobart, the Festival’s signature strangeness pulses through pubs, galleries and late-night lounges. At the Roving Scientist Bar inside Australia’s oldest pub, the Hope & Anchor, visitors can chat with a phenomenal range of scientists, learn to use a microscope, take in short talks at Science Open Mic or have a go improvising an absurd lecture at Powerpoint Karaoke. There will also be a chance to check out the DAVIAC, a working rebuild of a 1940s computer with well known scientist and tech entrepreneur Dr David Warren. Outside, Beaker Street Radio will be broadcasting live on Market Pl, alongside open fires, a cosy bar, and the occasional dinosaur dance-off.

Across the road at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery (TMAG) After Dark, audiences can drop in for live insect dissections, fossil preparation workshops, the chance to get your insect or seashell identified by a museum expert and play your way through decades of retro video games.

Midweek, a series of free events will enliven Hobart’s nightlife, with scientists taking over some of the city’s most popular venues during “Science in Salamanca,” including a rare chance to check out the Australian National Fish Collection, which holds more than 160,000 fish specimens, at CSIRO’s Open Night. Visitors to CSIRO can also catch a free behind-the-scenes talk by award-winning filmmaker Dr Frederique Olivier.

Family friendly activities are dotted throughout the festival, including TMAG’s Discovery Sunday and a family hour at the Roving Scientist Bar. Meanwhile, Glow in the YARC! lights up the Youth Arts and Recreation Centre with UV art party, glowing cupcakes and a jellyfish-inspired youth exhibition.

Festival organisers have also announced the lineup for their epic new program addition, After Hours, featuring 11 of Hobart’s hottest drag queens and boundary-shattering Australian First Nations performer Kitty Obsidian.

Beaker Street Festival is presented by Beaker Street, an independent charitable cultural organisation building community through scientific understanding in Lutruwita/Tasmania.

Beaker Street Festival is supported by the following Major Partners: the Tasmanian Government, City of Hobart, the Australian Government as part of National Science Week, and the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery. In addition, support from the Tasmanian Government, TasPorts, the City of Clarence, and Creative Australia has enabled the expansion of the Hobartica precinct.

As well as these just-announced new and free events, there are still ticketed events available to book, but they’re selling fast. Explore the full program at www.beakerstreet.com.au.

Images from top. Beaker Street Festival ANTARCTIC SPIRITS Credit: Sam Shelley; Beaker Street Festival DARK SKY DINNER Credit: Rosie Hastie; Beaker Street Festival DARK CITY WALK Credit: Luke Tscharke; Beaker Street Festival ANYTHING GLOWS Credit: Dearna Bond; Beaker Street Festival KITTY OBSIDIAN Credit: Joel Devereux